Blog Reflections (Practical 6)

In this week's EIR lesson, i learnt about another type of search - The invisible web database.

For the uninitiated, invisible web means

World Wide Web content that is not part of the surface Web, which is indexed by standard search engines.

Studies show that the invisible contains approximately 91000 terrabytes while the surface web which are searchable using search engines contains only a not so impressive 167 terrabytes.

So how do i search the invisible web? Using CompletePlanet and Academic Gateway.

For this blog reflection, i will be using completeplanet as a comparison between an invisible web database search facility vs Meta search and subject directory search.

First to compare, we need to know exactly what each search engine search for, the results that it generated and see if is is better or worst that it's peers.

For meta search engine , it searched from the common web surface using multiple search engines and gets the most relevant results from each search engine.

Subject directory search is not really a search results but it contains links to website that are related to a topic that is chosen.

Since i'm new to search the invisible web, i'll post one of my search results on it here.

Search: development of cancer research

1. Cancer Research Initiatives, National Cancer Institute
Summary: and Prognosis Cancer Control, Survivorship and Outcomes Biology Etiology Scientific Model Systems Cancer Research Training, Career ... Type of Cancer Bladder Cancer Brain Tumor Breast Cancer Cervical Cancer Colorectal Cancer Endometrial Cancer Esophageal ... Cancer Kidney Cancer Leukemia Liver Cancer Lung Cancer Lymphoma Melanoma Myeloma Ovarian Cancer Pancreatic Cancer Prostate ... Cancer Sarcoma Stomach Cancer Other Cancers All Cancers Most of NCI'S initiatives are intentionally defined in ... Science Planning Assessment Cancer Research Portfolio Progress Review Groups Plans Priorities for Cancer Research NCI Research ...
http://cri.nci.nih.gov/archives/archive.cfm
Relevance: Size: 18k Harvested: Fri Mar 05 12:52:03 CST 2004
Top of Page

2. Center for Cancer Research - Home
Summary: stories and research briefs News Center Home Clinical Trials For Patients For Physicians Clinical Director's Office ... Medical Oncology Clinical Research Unit Molecular Targets Development Program Molecular Therapeutics Program Translational Research Initiative Tumor ... Clinical Trials Research Employment Featured Initiatives News Events Site Privacy Policy Accessibility 2000-2001 Center for Cancer ... at the National Cancer Institute Link to FIRSTGOV ...
http://ccr.nci.nih.gov/
Relevance: Size: 25k Harvested: Wed Mar 10 13:56:40 CST 2004
Top of Page

Upon clicking on the links, i am utterly disappointed the 1st links brings me to an error page about query page not found, the 2nd link brings me to the MAIN page of a cancer related website instead of some latest news on cancer development that i wanted.

Simply clicking on this 2 links is enough to prevent me from further clicking on the 3rd and later links.

Really it doesn't take much time for me to actually decide which search facility is the better one. Infact my answer doesn't include "CompletePlanet".

Meta search is still the better search facility because i can get some real results instead of going to the main page of a website. Subject directory is also not far behide the ratings because it is actually a good way to search if i am not sure of the topic that i am looking for, still for this post i'll have to search meta search wins handsdown.

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I will not use invisible web for research on project/reports for my own diploma. Seeing how bad the search results are really puts me off and i believe from first hand experience i can search better and get more relevant results using other search facility.

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What i learn from my wiki experience this week

Just like my previous blog entry, wiki is definitely a convenient way to collaborate and share information. For my info refer to my previous blog entry.